Wahari

Wahari is the central culture-hero of Piaroa religion, the demiurge who shaped the dry land, raised its hills and rivers, gave form to the forest animals, and brought the Piaroa themselves into existence. He is the master of songs, holder of the chanted knowledge (menye) and of the hallucinogenic snuff yopo and the vine caapi, whose visionary sight underwrites all later shamanic practice. His mythology is deeply ambivalent: though he is a maker of worlds, he is also proud, appetitive and fallible, and the tales dwell on his transgressions, including in some tellings an incestuous desire for his sister. He stands in lifelong contest with the water-lord Kuemoi, who is at once his mother's brother and his father-in-law, a rivalry through which the dangerous powers of culture pass between land and water. At the close of the creation age Wahari is destroyed, and his person is thereafter bound to the tapir, the great land animal in which the vanished god endures. The Warime festival, with its hidden flutes and masked dancers, renews the fertility of game and re-enacts his deeds.

Parentage

• parent: Ofoda'eBoglar, L. (1978). Cuentos y mitos de los Piaroa. Caracas: Universidad Catolica Andres Bello. (secondary)

Domains

• forest and dry land
• sacred song
• hallucinogenic vision

Powers

• raise the forest, rivers and mountains
• sing the primordial songs
• command the vision of yopo and caapi
• take the form of the tapir

Epithets

• meñe ruwang — master of the sacred songsOvering, J. (1990). 'The Shaman as a Maker of Worlds.' Man (n.s.) 25(4): 602-619. (secondary)
• reu ruwang — lord of the tapirOvering, J. (1985). 'There Is No End of Evil.' In D. Parkin (ed.), The Anthropology of Evil, pp. 244-278. Oxford: Blackwell. (secondary)

Relations

• parent: Ofoda'eBoglar, L. (1978). Cuentos y mitos de los Piaroa. Caracas: Universidad Catolica Andres Bello. (secondary)
• sibling: BuokaOvering, J. (1990). 'The Shaman as a Maker of Worlds.' Man (n.s.) 25(4): 602-619. (secondary)
• spouse: CheheruSources differ on whether Cheheru is his wife by cross-cousin marriage or his own sister.Overing Kaplan, J. (1975). The Piaroa, a People of the Orinoco Basin. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (secondary)
• rival: KuemoiKuemoi is also his mother's brother and father-in-law; the two demiurges are locked in a contest over the powers of culture.Overing, J. (1986). 'Images of Cannibalism, Death and Domination in a Non-Violent Society.' In D. Riches (ed.), The Anthropology of Violence, pp. 86-102. Oxford: Blackwell. (secondary)

Sources

• Wahari is the principal Piaroa creator-hero, demiurge of the dry land, the forest and its animals, and the maker of the Piaroa people.: Overing Kaplan, J. (1975). The Piaroa, a People of the Orinoco Basin. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (secondary); Overing, J. (1990). 'The Shaman as a Maker of Worlds.' Man (n.s.) 25(4): 602-619. (secondary)
• As master of songs he holds the chanted knowledge (menye) and the hallucinogens yopo and caapi on which shamanic vision depends.: Rodd, R. (2002). 'Snuff Synergy.' Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 34(3): 273-279. (secondary); Rodd, R. (2008). 'Reassessing the Cultural and Psychopharmacological Significance of Banisteriopsis caapi.' Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 40(3): 301-307. (secondary)
• A fallible and even destructive figure, Wahari is finally slain in the myths and held to persist in the tapir.: Overing, J. (1985). 'There Is No End of Evil.' In D. Parkin (ed.), The Anthropology of Evil, pp. 244-278. Oxford: Blackwell. (secondary)